Smoothies are generally discouraged on Whole30. However, if you must have one, choose a recipe with no added sweeteners and low-sugar fruits. This smoothie is more scoopable with a spoon, so you can slow down and savor it (important on Whole30!). The only sweet flavor comes from fresh raspberries — plus, this packs your bowl with fats from avocado and coconut milk.

Overall, my biggest Whole30 lesson is that mindful eating is possible. I don't have that urge to eat everything in sight, but I also know I don't need to deprive myself or worry about food 24/7. There's a happy medium where I get to decide what I really crave, weigh whether it's worth the bloat or restless sleep I might experience after eating it, and then say yes or no. I've caught myself thinking like this more, and so the ultimate goal of Whole30 has worked: I've changed my relationship with food—for the better.
The CrossFit Games are the world’s premier test to find the Fittest on Earth™. They are world-renowned as a grueling test for the toughest athletes and a thrilling experience for spectators. Since its inception in 2007, the CrossFit Games have become “one of the fastest growing sports in America,” according to Forbes. The Games season is broken up into three stages. The first stage is the Open, the largest participatory sporting competition in the world. After the Open, top athletes from each of the 18 worldwide regions qualify for the second stage of competition—Regionals. Following Regionals, the top 40 men, 40 women and 40 teams move on to the final stage of competition: the CrossFit Games. The Games present the playing field where the fittest athletes are given a chance to distinguish themselves through consistently exceptional performances across broad time and modal domains. At the end of the competition, the Fittest on Earth are crowned™. To learn more, visit Games.CrossFit.com or Facebook.com/CrossFitGames.
The first thing you should make from this book? Red Curry Roasted Cauliflower (pg. 242). We've made it FIVE TIMES since we got the book. Super easy and so delicious. If you follow us @gneissspice on instagram, you’ll see dozens of posts of the meals I made from this book. I highly recommend this book, especially if you are debating a Whole30. Nothing is worse than trying to stick to the strict rules, and then have no idea what to eat for dinner. My only complaint about the book would be no mention of portion sizes. I had to head over to their website to find suggestions (they have a cool graphic for this, not sure why they didn’t include it in the book).

The Dietitian's Guide to Eating Bugs by Daniel Calder is a comprehensive guide to the nutritional content of insects. He believes insect breeding and consumption are important elements sustainable living, particularly when it comes to complementing foraged plant material with meat products. Numerous insects contain nutrients similar to those found in more conventional livestock, except the feed to conversion ratio is much higher and they're much cheaper to breed. You can find the book at scribd. Also available in e-book format for $35.

Here comes the tough love. This is for those of you who are considering taking on this life-changing month, but aren’t sure you can actually pull it off, cheat free, for a full 30 days. This is for the people who have tried this before, but who “slipped” or “fell off the wagon” or “just HAD to eat (fill in food here) because of this (fill in event here).” This is for you.
In court, Greg moved to block the sale. Lauren made a strong case. The $17.5 million, five-year payment plan he was offering was too risky, she said. In documents filed in court, she showed how much the company spent on what seemed to her like frivolous expenses, including an $11,000 a month lease on a house in San Diego and a $763,000 four-seater plane. The Anthos deal was cash, and she still says she honestly believes Anthos had CrossFit's best interests in mind. At one point, according to court filings, Anthos proposed that affiliates get 1 percent equity to cast a deciding vote where Anthos and Glassman disagreed.
Glassman is proud of his role in all this, but the system puts him and CrossFit at a very real risk. As the world of CrossFit grows, as more businesses enter and profit, and his share of it becomes smaller, CrossFit's greatest success--gaining mainstream acceptance as exercise and a sport--could turn it generic, like baseball or skiing. "One of our greatest fears is becoming escalator," says Dale Saran, CrossFit's general counsel, referring to what was once a trademarked name brand of Otis Elevator. So, although Glassman keeps the CrossFit business model radically loose and open, he protects the brand name with an iron fist.
Jan Engvald has studied food and health thoroughly in the literature. In Unexpected facts on... food he shows that today's health advice (more or less unchanged for more than 30 years) is a direct cause to the increase in national diseases like coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, obesity, adult-onset diabetes, allergy, eye diseases, etc. His findings are low-carb and high-fat, close to paleo, though he allows high fat dairy.

I often get caught up in focusing on numbers and scales, so I decided not to officially weigh myself before or after Whole30. But I can attest that everything about my body just felt better. I know saying something like "I lost eleven pounds" would sound much more convincing, but I could see that my stomach was slimmer, as was my face (which is awkwardly the first place I gain weight).

All involve eating whole foods (as opposed to packaged and processed) and filling your plate with quality sources of protein, healthy fats, complex carbohydrates, and vitamin-, mineral-, and fiber-rich vegetables. (Again, we’re talking about the ones that fall somewhere on the healthy spectrum, not unhealthy fad diets like, ahem, the Grapefruit Diet.)
Since 2009, Melissa Hartwig’s critically-acclaimed Whole30 program has quietly led hundreds of thousands of people to effortless weight loss and better health—along with stunning improvements in sleep quality, energy levels, mood, and self-esteem. The program accomplishes all of this by specifically targeting people’s habits and emotional relationships with food. The Whole30 is designed to help break unhealthy patterns of behavior, stop stress-related comfort eating, and reduce cravings, particularly for sugar and carbohydrates. Many Whole30 participants have described achieving “food freedom”—in just thirty days.
That severe carb restriction is meant to keep your body in a state of ketosis, says Alyssa Cohen, R.D. “Ketosis refers to the state of relying on ketone bodies for fuel,” Cohen explains. “Fat is the source used to make ketone bodies, so this diet aims to use fuel from fat, rather than carbohydrates [what our bodies primarily use for energy].” So basically, the keto diet helps you speed up the weight-loss process through fat burning.
The following links tend towards news reports of scientific studies that point out some positive aspect of the paleo diet. If you are looking for current news reports, I suggest signing up for Google Alerts for the Type: News. I have three set up, for: "caveman diet," "paleo diet," and "paleolithic diet." You can also set them up for blogs and/or websites.
Cordain argues that chimpanzees and horses avoid meat, and they have big bellies that we would have if we didn’t ditch plants for meat. He also says meat increased human brain size, and decreased stomach size so we can have the six-pack abs that chimps can’t. But I looked at his endnotes with citations to research and couldn’t find the source for these theories. I also couldn’t find research showing that legumes and grains were invented by humans.
Still, it was a tad depressing to watch my boyfriend eat whatever he wanted while I was on the sideline sipping tea. "I miss sharing food memories with you," he said at one point. Sigh. So the next day, we headed to a local brunch spot, and I ordered a Whole30–compliant dish from the menu. I got a bunless burger topped with a fried egg, avocado, lettuce, tomato, and onion plus a side salad instead of fries. Let me tell you, this bunless burger tasted like the juiciest thing I'd eaten in my entire life. After nearly two weeks of cooking every meal, it was nice to have someone else do it for me.
It’s easy to find more guidance online, but a book also makes a handy reference. "The Paleo Diet," for example, outlines basic Paleo principles and offers three “levels” that allow for different degrees of cheating – three “open meals” per week on the “entry level” plan, two on “maintenance” and just one on “maximal.” Depending on the level, you might also get “transitional” condiments (low-fat dressing and salsa) and drinks (coffee, beer or wine in moderation) to wash down the meat and plants. You can use the levels as you like. Start with the first and move gradually to the more restrictive – or just stay put. For more dramatic changes, head right to the third.
The Vegetarian Myth: Food, Justice, and Sustainability by Lierre Keith is against industrial farming. She spent 20 years as a vegan, and now reveals the risks of a vegan diet, and explains why animals belong on ecologically sound farms. And as all the neolithic foods we avoid are produced on industrial farms, she is against the foods we avoid. Here's a well thought out review by Eric Wargo: Clubbing Vegetarians Over the Head With the Truth.
Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human by Richard Wrangham. This book argues that the ease of digestion and the added nutritional value available in cooked food was the key behind the explosion of human intelligence. (Cooking gelatinizes starch, denatures protein, and softens all foods, permitting more complete digestion and energy extraction. As a result, the food processing apparatus shrinks, freeing energy to support a larger brain.) He then suggests that cooking led to what eventually became marriage and the sexual division of labor. The two most helpful reviews at Amazon get into great detail. The reviews average to 4+ stars.
The kettlebell starts on the ground and finishes directly overhead with the elbow locked out at full extension over the top of the shoulder and in line with the athletes head. The kettlebell must pass between the knees on the bottom portion of the movement, and does NOT have to touch the ground at the bottom of each rep. Alternating of arms is NOT required. The athlete may break up the reps between arms however they please. Changing arms must occur when the kettlebell is on the ground. You cannot change arms mid-rep or mid-air.
Since there will be so many individuals (almost 400) at The Games, expect the first handful of events to be a “culling of the herd”. From what I’m gathering, we can expect to see about 75 - 90% of the field eliminated in the first half of The Games events. The remaining Games events would be more of what we’re used to: 40 men & 40 women competing for a chance at the title.
Remove the chicken from the curry sauce and discard the extra sauce. Add the chicken, breast-side down, to the grill and sear until golden brown, about 2 minutes. (When the meat is properly seared it will pull off the grates very easily, so don’t rush this step.) Turn the chicken over so the bone side is down and place over indirect heat. Cover with the grill lid and continue to cook until the internal temperature of the chicken is 160°F, or the breast meat springs back when pressed with a finger. This will take 10 to 15 minutes, depending on thickness.
Don’t pour all the curry sauce over the chicken; once the mixture has come into contact with the raw meat, you have to throw it out. Instead, place your chicken in a shallow bowl, and pour a little of the sauce over the chicken. Brush or rub it evenly over the meat, then flip and repeat on the other side. Save the extra sauce to drizzle over the top of this dish before serving, or use it to top tomorrow night’s chicken, shrimp, or vegetables.
Plus, I feel like the way I eat directly affects my mood. If I eat sugar, I almost always feel like garbage. If I eat protein and veggies and tons of avocado, I feel stable and much less like I am going to have a stage-four meltdown. Blood sugar swings are also real — no one wants to deal with me when I am hangry. It’s a nightmare. This program is supposed to help with all these things. I desperately wanted to feel better, so I dove in.
Overall, my biggest Whole30 lesson is that mindful eating is possible. I don't have that urge to eat everything in sight, but I also know I don't need to deprive myself or worry about food 24/7. There's a happy medium where I get to decide what I really crave, weigh whether it's worth the bloat or restless sleep I might experience after eating it, and then say yes or no. I've caught myself thinking like this more, and so the ultimate goal of Whole30 has worked: I've changed my relationship with food—for the better.
In 2011, the Games adopted an online qualification format, facilitating participation by athletes worldwide. During the five-week-long "CrossFit Open", one new workout is released each week. Athletes have several days to complete the workout and submit their scores online, with either a video or validation by a CrossFit affiliate. Since the Open is available to any level of athlete, many affiliates encourage member participation and the number of worldwide participants can be in the hundreds of thousands.[48]